GameWeek 12 Review

It’s weeks like these that make me think that I am incapable of scoring anywhere near well. Loads of goals flew in from popular players, as well as assists to boot. Yet I still missed the boat. Let’s take a quick squizz over the games so far (West Ham v Stoke is tonight.)

Arsenal 5 – 2 Tottenham

Tottenham changed their formation to include both Adebayor and Defoe, and AVB looked like reaping the benefits before Adebayor undid his earlier good work with a sloppy challenge on Cazorla. Did it warrant a red card? I thought a yellow would have been justified, but Webb didn’t see it that way. Perhaps he got confused and thought Arsenal’s red strip was actually Manchester United’s. Anyway, that changed the whole game, as Arsenal peppered Spurs down the wings. Podolski and Cazorla justified me trading them out as they were always going to, by piling home the points. Mertesacker even got amongst it! Bale scored late as he always does when a bulk of people trade him out.

Liverpool 3 – 0 Wigan

A commanding performance by Liverpool, as Rogers kept his 5-3-2 system. One player who has really shot out of the blocks is Enrique. A goal and an assist, as well as a clean sheet sees his stocks surely rise. Suarez is a gem. 2 more goals indicates that he is finally learning how to put the ball in the back of the net more often. Sterling also chipped in with a nice 9 points for his owners that played him. For Wigan, it was just another case of the good, the bad and the ugly. You never know what they’ll serve up.

Man City 5 – 0 Aston Villa

Man City dominated. It was the Tevez, Aguero and Silva show. The two strikers seem to get so much more supply from the Spanish maestro, which should see their output skyrocket. Can Mancini keep this run of form up? Villa though, to be fair, are a bunch of derpas this year, and haven’t really looked threatening.

Newcastle 1 – 2 Swansea

Ba got on the scoresheet, but it was to no avail as Michu and De Guzman handed the win to the Swans. I’m finding it bloody hard to predict both of these sides this year- both have bags of offensive potential but a shaky defence to say the least. Injuries have played their part in both teams, and apart from Ba, Michu and maybe Hernandez, I don’t particularly like any FPL options.

QPR 1 – 3 Southampton

QPR are absolutely woeful. Any team that loses this badly to Southampton have to be playing pretty ordinary football. Southampton’s defence is shaky at best…and the fact that a QPR attack could only score 1 goal vs them, at home, with Hoilett, Taarabt and Zamora up front, speaks volumes. They’re in a lot of trouble. Puncheon looks like a handy little acquisition, and you could do far worse for bench fodder. Lambert also got on the scoresheet, giving his owners a slight reprieve given his torrid last month.

Reading 2 – 1 Everton

Ahhh Everton, Everton, Everton. We’re seeing a reversal of their normal “slow-start”, and are finally coming back to earth after their barn-storming opening to the season. Reading, to their credit, played to their strengths, and Le Fondre showed his credentials with a well earned brace, after Naismith buried the opener for Everton. Bad news for Fellaini owners, he picked up a yellow card, his fifth of the year and will miss the next match. Bugger.

West Brom 2 – 1 Chelsea

The less I say about this the better. West Brom are a good team, and Clarke has them playing very accountable, structured football. At home they are a force to be reckoned with, and Long is showing that he is a very good player, this time taking centre stage with a goal and an assist. On Chelsea’s side, it was good to see Hazard back on the scoresheet. But down back, it got messy. Luiz is simply an awful defender, and I’m absolutely sick of him. Cahill isn’t well enough equipped to deal with his frailties, and Bertrand is too inexperienced to feature alongside a CB with down syndrome. Torres is a sooky la-la, but his replacement in Sturridge is an arrogant prat. But apart from that wooo yeah Chelsea!

Norwich 1 – 0 Man United

Wow. Just wow. Credit to Norwich though, they deserved the fought out win. Hernandez started in place of Rooney, and boy was that a mistake. Without someone creating chances in the midfield (Hernandez is purely a tap in player), RVP and he saw nothing of it. Pilkington’s strike was awesome, and clinched the 3 points for Hughton’s men. This game completely screwed any multibet that I had going… so cheers for that Norwich. Also a shout out to RVP who rewarded my -4 transfer hit with a captains score of 4. Cheers.

Fulham 1 – 3 Sunderland

Where did this result come from? After being reduced to ten men- courtesy of Hangeland’s red card (of course he’s in my team), Fletcher and Cuellar put Sunderland in front. A final Sessegnon strike on the counter ended any hopes of a Fulham revival, after Petric gave them some form of resistance. On the injury front, Ruiz hobbled off and is expected to miss weeks, which could mean Berbatov will decline without the creativity of the Costa Rican.

So, how did we do? Personally, my choice of RVP out for Podolski absolutely killed me, and Cuellar on the bench instead of Hangeland cost me 9 points. I was sitting pretty with 43 points with 2 players in the Fulham game, only to have that reduced to 42. Great.

Score: 56
Players left: Jaask still going and McAuley to be replaced by the bench (Lambert’s 9)
Captain: Fellani
Lord: Cazorla! Ba, Michu, Bale, Hazard, Lambert (off the bench), and I guess Fellani for scoring.
Loser: Fellani for being suspended, Baines, Rafael, Berba
Trades: Not sure yet, but Baines and Rafael are taking up 13.7 mill of my salary cap and have definitely not been giving me the returns they should over the last few weeks.